The employment situation in the US is not getting better, particularly for young people out of college.And this brings us to the "Who is the "customer"in education?" question. It is certainly not the student as the authors suggest and the simple answer from this blog's pont of view is the next link in the supply chain ! That is:
Elementary School–>Middle School–>High School—>Job/vocational training/college—>job/grad school—>job!
No matter which way you look at it, ultimately education must provide a livelihood to the student. While Michael Courtney and Amy Courtney have some great arguements let me add that the entire chain pictured above must work well from an information and trend point of view. That is :
What skills does this job require ? —> High School/Vocational School/College/Grad School
In a globalized highly inter connected world, it's very difficult for leaders in education to keep track of this but they must so that we teach our young people things that matter to joining the workforce.
But that's not all:
Since the customer's (i.e. the ultimate employer's) needs keep changing, with more globalization and technology, we all need to be perpetual learners- whether in school or not.